Daily updates about Syria

6/17/2014

Omar Abu Liala, the spokesman for the General Staff of the FSA denied that the ISIL has stopped its fighting in Syria. He said that large amounts of support for the ISIL have been arriving from Iraq. He accused of Malaki, the president of Iraq, of fabricating the collapse of the army and orering troops to withdraw from Mosul in order yo aid the ISIL, although he did not say how he came by this information.

Documents leaked to the news organization Zaman al-Wasl show that the rebel leader Abu Hatem al-Daheek essentially stole $2.3 million that was given to him to break through the al-Molouk checkpoint in Homs northern countryside and break the siege imposed on the neighborhoods in the Old City. The money was to purchase arms and ammunition.

The al-Molouk checkpoint is heavily fortified and contains a large number of soldiers.

Daheek is the sole rebel owner of tanks and armored vehicles in the region.

Since receiving the money at the beginning of the year he has been manipulating and making excuses and still has made no move on the checkpoint, or to help rebels in Homs who have asked him for it.

Rebels from the FSA and Jabhat al-Nusra took control of the al-Qaim border crossing after security forces withdrew from the Iraqi side. The rebels already had the Syrian side under their control.

3 men, including at least 1 NDF fighter, were killed and 35 people, mostly SAA soldiers and NDF fighters, were injured by rebel mortars in the government-held village of al-Sa’en in Hama province.

A video of an SAA rocket attack on Nawa:

A car bomb in Deir Ez Zor province in the village of Shmeitiyeh killed 7 people, including an Ahrar al-Sham commander and a judg affiliated with Jabhat al-Nusra. The bomb went off near the offices of the two groups. Nobody has claimed responsibility for the attack yet.

In a separate attack in Deir Ez Zor, an ISIL fighter detonated an explosive belt outside the home of a local rebel commander in the village of Huwayej, killing his two sons and wounding him.

The ISIL is attempting to push into the rebel-held village of Basira in Deir Ez Zor.

The Syrian government is being accused by rebels, al-Qaeda defectors, and western intelligence agencies, of funding and cooperating with al-Qaeda in a complex double game by purchasing oil and gas from wells under Jabhat al-Nusra’s control. They are also accused of releasing prisoners of extremists groups to strengthen their ranks at the expense of more moderate groups, and persuade the west that the uprising is sponsored primarily by Jihadist groups. Intelligence agencies say that the collaboration began in the spring of 2013.

The Syrian Air Force conducted airstrikes against the ISIL for the fourth consecutive day in ar-Raqqa, killing 7 civilians and an unknown number of ISIL fighters.

The death toll from the barrel bomb attack on the marketplace in Aleppo city yesterday rose to 35 people and injured 60.